


Camp Capable

by MountainRose



Series: Tumblr Prompts [1]
Category: The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Babies, Children, Disabled Children, Enabled Children, Gen, Orphans, Prosthesis, Where The 'tax write-off's Go, Where the money goes, charity work
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-13
Updated: 2015-02-13
Packaged: 2018-03-12 05:02:32
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,072
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3344594
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MountainRose/pseuds/MountainRose
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tony's philanthropist title isn't just because of his money; he's generous with his <em>time</em> too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Camp Capable

**Author's Note:**

> Anonymous asked: Could I prompt you a wee one? The Avengers finding out just how much Tony gives of his money but more importantly, his time to charity, especially a children's charity? Like visits and trips with the kids etc. Especially the teeny, tiny ones. I just feel like Tony needs some love right now with all the AUO trailer idiocy in the tags and you write a perfect Tony. Thank you.

"Nope, I’m booked right up; June’s a busy, busy month for me."

Steve groaned and let his elbows slide out from under him, laying himself out flat on the breakfast bar. “You can’t be serious! I don’t want to be the sole face of ‘Avengers Tower’ for seven _days_.”

Tony patted the back of his head, and it was actually very comforting. “Sorry, old man, this one’s been on my calendar for longer than you’ve been awake.” Tony’s coffee mug vanished from Steve’s despondent gaze’s range, preceding a quiet sip and satisfied sigh. “Though if you’ll make me coffee like this every day, you can come too, holy smokes, Cap—”

Steve heaved himself back into the land of the dignified, with pretty undignified enthusiasm. “Really? Thanks! I’ll pack a bag, should I bring the shield?”

Tony gawped at him, but that was no surprise; Steve really couldn’t leave off the whole of January without someone making a fuss. Good thing he was in the mood for one hell of a fuss. “I, what?”

"Great, I’ll just, go. Talk to Pepper! Thanks for this, Tony!" He beat a hasty retreat, leaving Tony adrift in the kitchen. He really didn’t care what deals and brokering and manufacturing bullshit Tony was headed out to handle, he just needed out of the city for a while. Besides, he could come back whenever; it wasn’t like Tony ever stayed the full length of a slot booked into his calendar, unless he stayed waaay longer than he was supposed to. He missed training, he missed meeting, he never handed in his threat assessments, and he spent way too long covered in grease rather than doing actual business—

Actually, Steve couldn’t fault him for that, they guy was a born grease monkey; he looked more at home working on his vintage vanity projects than he did glad handing his Board.

"Hey, Ms. Potts, I was wondering…"

——————————-

"Pepper. Pep, what have I done?"

"Oh Tony."

——————————

They pulled up at a conference centre, three hours’ drive from the airport. Steve had slept through the traffic and suburbs, then watched bleary-eyed as they drove steadily thicker parkland until the trees opened up to a big bit of grassland, dotted with big, glass buildings.

"Why’s there grass?" He mumbled, squinting at the roof of the nearest one.

"Hmm? Oh, on the tops? Cool in summer, warm in winter, and a biodiversity boost. Butterflies, or something; not my field."

Steve nodded absently, watching the other…guests? Participants? Milling under a living awning in the distance. Tony was laughing to himself in the background, but not at anything Steve picked up on.

"C’mon, sleepyhead. Up and out. The kids are gonna love your bed head; remind me to never book you a red eye again, you didn’t sleep at all, did you?"

He hadn’t, not even the bed linens (unsubtle, and the same as where on his own bed) could make him settle on a plane, even a silent, repulsor propelled one. “Wait, kids?”

The milling bodies in the distance resolved into playing children, shambling around with balls and…wheelchairs? At least half had a … No, they all had a prosthetic, or an eye patch, or _something_. Steve’s throat closed up and he stopped following Tony when a little girl took a puff on an inhaler held by a uniformed nurse.

"Yeah, kids, all the kids, kids in every nook and cranny and wheelchair-accessible bathroom. Which is all of them. Steve?"

He watched one of them lock their chair, climb out of it and take four unsteady steps to join in a game of jenga, sprawled on the grass.

"Oh my god."

"Steve? What’s wrong? Are you having a flashback? Is it the inhalers? Because we can take a second, they haven’t spotted us yet— uh, never mind, brace for impact."

Tony strode forwards into the oncoming group of disabled kids, fielding greetings like he…did this every year. Of course he did. Tony knew this place, well enough to not need directions on a three hour drive, well enough that he called to some of the older kids by name.

Wheelchairs with pink rims and flame decals, a fingerless hand with blue and green acrylic digits, an eye patch with the Hulk on it, a fake leg covered in brass pistons and cogs with a fully functional set of toes inside princess sandals.

Steve was overwhelmed by the press of children, their wheels and legs and hands and eyes and… The girl with the inhaler was standing back a little way, with a loose bunch of other kids, all wearing a purple sash, some with them hooked over the back of their chairs, or tied onto a crutch, and smiling. Some openly, some a little nervously, but all baseline _happy_.

He kept looking, senses a little swamped, and caught sight of other sashes, blue and yellow and, on the little boy that had climbed onto Tony’s shoulder, white.

"And that, is Steve Rogers, asthmatic, heart murmur. Grew out of them."

Steve shook himself and put on his best smile. “Nice to meet y’all.”

"Just keep breathing!" they chorused, then broke down into a gaggle of some of the strangest welcome messages he’d ever experienced.

Tony was in the middle of a knot of white and yellow sash children, handing out hugs and hair tousling, and looked up at Steve over their heads. “Welcome to Camp Capable, Steve.”

"Now!" Tony exclaimed, clapping his hands and standing up straight. "Where’s my yellow flag! Anyone got a spare?"

—————————

After things had calmed down a bit, Steve made Tony that coffee he’d promised, though it probably wasn’t up to his usual standard. The kids had gone to bed, or were in the area, watching a movie, but Steve could still feel the life humming in the ground where their mismatched feet and wheels had tromped.

"Here."

"Thanks. They’re a handful, but you get used to it, and it’s only a month." Tony said with a tired smile. Steve marvelled at its simplicity; no press here, no shark toothed gleam. "You got questions?"

The coffee was apparently up to snuff after all, because Tony melted into the couch with bliss. Steve had to cough to clear his throat. “Uh, I guess I do. Why’re you ‘yellow’?”

"Huh, I did not expect that to be your opening gambit. Maybe something like ‘where did all the legs go,’ or maybe-" he put of a funny voice that Steve guessed was supposed to be him, "-’what is this, Mr. Stark?’ But no, flags first."

Steve waited for Tony to dig something rustling out of his coat pocket, which was hanging on the back of their chosen couch. “They’re touch flags. White is ‘yes’, yellow is ‘let me see you first’, hmm blue,” he held up a little cloth square packed in crinkly plastic, which was indeed blue, “is…’me first, then maybe’ and purple is ‘okay, but no crowds’. We don’t have any grey this year, but if it turns up unexpectedly, it’s ‘just no’.”

Steve reached out for the white curiously, but Tony pulled it back a little. “Aha, ah, I’ve seen how you react to something you don’t expect touching you. Think about it for a second.”

Steve did, imagining having a bad day, and an unfamiliar kid in a silent wheelchair coming up on him when he wasn’t expecting it. He reached for yellow instead.

"There you go. Anyone can change their mind, whenever. Sometimes a new arm or leg needs some getting used to, or they’ve had a bit of surgery and they shift around, or maybe they had a bad dream or just woke up feeling blue. You can do… Whatever. They know what the colours mean, helps them look after themselves."

Steve pulled the tough, silky fabric out of its packaging and ran it over his fingers. “This place is amazing. You—”

Tony grinned fever-bright. “You haven’t seen half of it yet; there’s a pool and a river for swimming, climbing wall, tree fortresses—!”

Steve reached over, making eye contact because Tony was ‘feeling yellow’ still, and took a hold of his wrist. “Tony, this is amazing, this place is like a dream.”

"I— yeah. It was, a dream I mean, so I just… Pep did most of the ground work, I mean, literally, had to buy the ground, and…I can only give a month, shit is way too busy," Steve cut him off with a gentle squeeze.

"Give me the tour?"

Tony leapt at the opportunity, his eyes all gleeful spark, and their hands swapped places as Tony pulled him out of the den. “There’s a whole bunch of medical stuff, and that’s what gets the most use the rest of the year; new kids, with new hurts or old ones who’ve grown, but this month, June? They just come, no excuse necessary. And no fee. Mom and dad, or Auntie or whoever, get the month off, or come with and— there’s a spa? Pepper handled it. But you don't wanna see the hospital stuff, it sucks. You wanna see the toys?”

Steve swallowed down a rush of feeling, Tony all proud and excited was somethin’ else. “Yeah, sure. Toys. And the pool, gotta see that.”

Tony babbled on about the solar water heating, and the soft play’s sound system, and Steve followed along with sore eyes and sore cheeks from smiling. The pool was great, like a beach with soft, rubbery sand, and water jets and slides and no steps anywhere, and lights like the aurora.

Eventually, Tony seemed almost talked out, and Steve was peacefully imagining the babble of all those kids letting loose in any one of the spaces Tony had made for them. The last corner they rounded together was obviously near the edge of the medical building, and Tony went peacefully, habitually, quiet. The place had an aura of deliberate peace about it, and Steve could just about hear soft voices nearby.

"Sometimes, there aren’t moms and dads, and sometimes that happens way too soon. CPS does its best, but, they can’t do what we can. Don’t wake em up, okay?’

Steve nodded, realising that the soft, round smell here was that of babies, the very young and helpless. Milk and diapers and subtly warm skin. Tony pushed a door open into a gently lit ward, with four cots, instead of beds. Two of them were occupied, and three people sat in the middle of the room, talking quietly, with one tiny baby on the red-heads lap. No, not talking. One of them was reading out loud.

"Voices, they sleep better. I proved it." The reader waved Tony forwards and Steve followed on hushed feet. A little arm waved out of the blanket, with a gurgle that didn’t sound unhappy, and their nurse shifted them to her shoulder, where they made snuffling noises.

The babies other arm worked free of the blanket, and there was no hand at the end of it.

Steve sat down suddenly, more overwhelmed than Tony’s bright smiles could compensate for, and the nurse who had been reading handed his book off and came over. “Hey there, just keep breathing, yeah? She’s fine.”

Tony drifted back, his hip warm against Steve’s shoulder.

"I— how? _Who--_?!" Steve stuttered.

"No one, Cap. She was born without it, and Mom didn’t make it, or dad. Look."

Tony was crouching, the baby bundled in his arms expertly. She was wide awake and waving at him, eyes still the bright blue of really little babies. She was smiling.

Steve blew out all his protective anger in one long breath and let her grab his finger with her good hand. The other had some of a palm, and it paped against his thumb and she half-curled around it.

"See that?" Tony hushed with subdued elation. "She’s gonna have a great grip! Did you see Ben’s hand? He was the same, the curl of their palm is more’n enough to power a prosthetic."

"I see it. She’s gonna be OK, huh?"

"Yeah, Steve. They’re all gonna be great."

"You’re amazing, all of you…" He said it to all four of them, foster carers or nurses, or whatever they were, and Tony most of all, because he’d never really known where the money from the galas and ‘tax write offs’ and all the rest _went_. But now he did, and it was… Amazing.


End file.
